Let us discuss this motherfuckin game some more. I want to focus on this subject: Ashley Hall. The game makes it a point that Simon is responsible for her death, but the point is made kind of in passing, by mentioning that he was driving the car, and also putting her broken face (who else could it be?) on the main cover and menu. Also, there is a deleted scene where Simon visits the grave of his mother, and Ashley is standing there in her green dress, her face a mass of crawling worms. I think in that version of the story, she was supposed to be Simon's sister.
Question 1: Why is the point about Simon's guilt made offhand, in passing, implied by the image of her cracked face? Wouldn't it make more sense to explicitly mention the girlfriend (not really but you know) subject, thus making Simon's guilt the main reason for why he descends into Hell? Because otherwise, it would seem like he's just a nice guy whose life got totally destroyed for no reason other than him being nice and too trusting of doctors with big scanning chairs. Again, this subject of "guilt for death of a woman" is implied by him occupying two female dead bodies. What is the point of an implied subject that is never stated explicitly?
2) Of course, the main decision-making part of the game comes from having options to kill multiple "persons" over the game's course, implying that Simon is suffering some kind of penance for being a murderer. In fact, he is implied to be a worse kind of murderer than Daniel from Amnesia. He just likes to fucking pull fully human personalities out of their sockets forever, screaming at women and crashing cars with female colleagues, but only after they rejected him (then drinking something green from a bottle named GaduTAN). Anyway, what is the main reason why Simon is told to be a nice guy by the written story, but actually implied to be a creep and a woman killer between the lines? 3) Simon lives in a green room. Ashley wears a green dress. "It's green", she says, about the light or about the contents of Gadutan bottle? Note how the color green is only mentioned in relation to Ashley, and the rest of the game is colored black and blue. When Simon returns to his green room to see his "Lynn" in her green dress, that's like the only moment of true respite in the entire game. In Amnesia: Rebirth, the color green is the main color of a Matriarchal dimension, where the pregnant female protagonist suffers from slowly decomposing and turning into an undead. This makes a question: can Tasi be somehow related to Ashley, since they are both beautiful females who suffer death, and are color-coded with "dark green"?
Brayden Turner
Color-coding: the most sneaky way to tell a story ever? I really had not noticed this stuff until I became fully "enlightened".
what canon decisions do you think Simon would have made regarding who to kill?
Brandon Davis
Think of it this way: Soma is Amnesia 3. Rebirth is Amnesia 4. 3: The number of the Sea, also known as del Mar or More (M=13). Also the number of Black Death, disease and general darkness. 4: The number of Female. "The Fo[u]rce is female". "May the 4th be with you". By the color green connected to the Forest, with plenty of green 3's.
Jayden Mitchell
soma good rebirth bad
unironically.
Jack Moore
SOMA would've been better without enemies and without a failstat
Wyatt Allen
Well, yeah, no shit. Soma felt like a cool blockbuster movie with a relatively happy ending. Playing Rebirth left me with a taste of necrotic green flesh in my mouth. Even the music in it sounds like it was "decomposed".
Chase Stewart
>relatively happy ending what
Hudson Baker
This is the most autistic schizo thread I've seen in a while, what the fuck are you talking about?
Matthew Brooks
Pretty sure that got patched in as a mode a few months after release. Or was that a mod? Either way I disagree, the enemies were some of the best creature design Frictional have done. Far better encounter design than any of the Amnesia games.
Easton Torres
In context of the game, it is. Science fiction is a romantic genre. Simon could just wander on the ocean floor while bits of "Star Trek" music and quotes play in his mind. And don't tell me that you actually cared about Catherine (the opposite of Erine, or "Green Peace).
Carter Brooks
>Catherine (the opposite of Erine, or "Green Peace).
dude what
Julian Torres
Some of the enemies were good. I liked the proxies and especially Akers, who reminded me of something you'd see in Amnesia. The rest were so-so. Buckethead or whatever she was called wasn't that spooky. The fish things weren't scary. The only other spooky enemy is only encountered once in a small segment at the very end of the game which was disappointing.
Michael Harris
Names have meanings. As a Japanese person, we know that all names have ancient meaning. And the name "Erina" denotes peace, love, air and green paradise. The name "Cat" though is a symbol of Night, of shadows and pale moonlight that leads the wanderer astray (from the word Astra, to the stars, that is).
Joshua Price
Yeah, spooky diving lad should've been in it more. I love the concept of a haunted divingsuit/spacesuit. I thought the first thing was great as well. It was just a big fuck off robot but it had a bit of Ray Harryhausen to its animation which was unxepectedly freaky as fuck.
Logan Rodriguez
>broken face on menu but wasn’t that Catherine’s face
Henry Young
It was, you see it in whole when you finish the game. I've no idea what OP's banging on about.
Alexander Morris
I'm almost positive that Catherine is who it's suppose to be. The face is only broken until you complete the game, then it repairs and looks like her. I really don't think it's suppose to be Ashley as OP says.
Jordan Brooks
Actually no. Catherine's face is the one that gets mended after you complete the game. Can you not tell an Asiatic oval face from a distinctly beautiful white female with a round face and blue eyes? Grow a brain, moran.
Ryan Bennett
Nah, it's definitely Catherine, it's the same face you see in the game over screen all fucked up. >Grow a brain, moran. At least get the quote right.
Brandon Turner
The broken face has several images that change as you go through the game, none of them look like Catherine (half-Chinese). Ashley died in a car crash, it would make sense for the broken face to be hers. Also it would make story sense if you play another horror game called "Outlast 2" and see how the character of "Lynn" there is connected to the main character (protagonist).
Ayden Nguyen
this is overstated. Some of the encounters are pretty lame, but there a few that do enough to add inject some tension into experience, overall they're not that big of a deal.
Xavier Allen
This writing style is giving me a minor anxiety attack.
Liam Adams
(This face is obvously fully white female and looks like a generic "Lynn" character from Outlast 2).
>it's the same face you see in the game over screen all fucked up Actually no, in those screens you see faces of Imogen Reed or Raleigh Herber, because Simon's mind is occupying their bodies, so it is as if they are dying when he dies.
John Watson
Really? I need to play through this again then. That's actually really interesting, recently played through the Amnesia games for the first time as well so a replay of Soma would be timely.
Camden Ramirez
>This writing style is giving me a minor anxiety attack. You have not seen anything yet... I am Swery65, currently working on "Deadly Premonition 3", nice to meet you.
Xavier Lopez
Bump for explanation to a layman who only played SOMA
Josiah White
Let's have a beer Swery-lad!
Chase Perry
For complete visual explanation, refer to the movie "Snuff 21: My First Kill" by Psycho-Thrillers Films, and think of it as if the male character is Simon, and the female protagonist is Ashley.
